


Gentle Knights and Patient Wolves

by coffeeinallcaps



Category: Kingsman: The Secret Service (2015)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Canonical Child Abuse, M/M, Pining, Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-08
Updated: 2015-12-29
Packaged: 2018-06-07 19:17:25
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 9,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6820768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeeinallcaps/pseuds/coffeeinallcaps
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eggsy and Harry fall into each other like pieces of a puzzle.</p><p>(A collection of unrelated angsty ficlets.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. b is for booze

**Author's Note:**

  * For [venvephe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/venvephe/gifts), [DivineProjectZero](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DivineProjectZero/gifts).



> A long time ago in a galaxy far far away, I thought it would be a good idea to challenge the Hartwin fandom's resident heartbreaker listentotheshityousay to an angst-off. The idea was to pick 26 words from A to Z and write angsty ficlets based on those words, because there is no such thing as too much angst ~~with a happy ending~~. This is where I’ll be archiving all the ficlets that are actual ficlets, rather than not!fic or drabbles (which means some words will be missing--which means there will not, in fact, be 26 chapters in total, but I thought a number would look better than the question mark).
> 
> Title is completely random; I found it in my "potential titles" document and I thought, why the hell not use it now.
> 
> See venvephe's [Every Other Dawn](http://archiveofourown.org/works/6037882) for excellent fluffy fills of these same prompts.
> 
> I'm trying to backdate these so the original posting dates will show up rather than the date I started cross-posting (May 11, 2016), and it's probably gonna go horribly wrong, so, um, please bear with me here.

Eggsy is thirteen the first time he swipes a beer from the fridge when his mum isn’t home. He enjoys the cold weight of the bottle in his hand—it makes him feel tough, mature—but the beer itself tastes bitter and unsavoury, tingles uncomfortably on his tongue. Still he finishes it, because of the thrill of the fact that it isn’t allowed and because he knows better than to let things go to waste. He can’t tell whether it’s the adrenaline or the booze or the carbonation that makes his stomach feel queasy afterwards. In any way, he doesn’t understand why his mum and her boyfriend seem to like it so much.

Eggsy is fourteen the first time Dean offers him a beer at dinner, and he hesitates but he doesn’t want to tell Dean no. “C’mon, Michelle,” Dean says, grinning at her look of disapproval. “One drink won’t hurt now, will it? There’s a good chap.” Dean cracks the beer open for him, ruffles his hair. Eggsy takes a few sips. “C’mon now, finish your drink,” Dean tells him good-naturedly when they’re done eating, and Eggsy nods, sips from the lukewarm liquid.

Eggsy is fifteen the first time he gets wasted. He meets up in the park with a couple other kids from the estate, all of them bringing something. Eggsy takes a six-pack from the fridge; they drink so much they ain’t likely to miss it, he thinks. The taste is still bitter and unsavoury but after chugging a few cans the tingles on his tongue stop bothering him and the queasy feeling in his stomach disappears. His mind drifts. He understands, now, why—back then—the booze seemed to calm his mum down, soothe her mind. Made her cry more but hurt less. He understands now why she seems to like it so much.

When he gets back home the next morning, he feels tired and shaky and he’s already thrown up twice. His clothes smell. _He_ smells. He wants to shower and sleep. It’s Saturday, so his mum will be volunteering, and Dean—

Dean’s sitting at the kitchen table, a six-pack in front of him.

Another wave of nausea.

“Sit down, kid,” Dean says in the eerily calm voice he uses before he starts yelling.

Eggsy sits down.

“I coulda sworn I’d bought another pack o’these bastards,” Dean says, nodding at the six-pack on the table. “Don’t suppose you can tell us what happened to it?”

“I took it,” Eggsy says, heart beating wildly in his throat, because he knows it’s better not to lie, not to stall. “I took it, I’m sorry, I won’t…”

Dean reaches for the beers, breaks the plastic, cracks one open. “You took it,” he says. “What’s a kid like you gonna do with six beers?”

“My mates,” Eggsy says. Another wave of nausea. “We—”

“You handed ’em out to yer mates?” Dean asks, in the same voice.

“No,” Eggsy says reflexively. “No, I mean I had a few—”

“How many?”

“Wha—”

“How many did you have yerself?”

“Three, I guess,” Eggsy says, adding, “no, four,” when Dean’s eyes narrow.

Dean says, “Three or four, kid?”

“Four, definitely four,” Eggsy says, because it appears to be the better answer. And maybe this is about that; maybe Dean doesn’t mind that he took the six-pack, maybe he just didn’t want Eggsy to—

Dean takes the opened can, shoves it in Eggsy’s direction. A bit of beer splashes out through the opening.

“Go on then,” Dean says. “Have at it.”

“I—” Eggsy says.

“You take six, you drink six.” Dean takes another can out of the plastic, sets it down between the two of them.

Eggsy looks at the beer. Another wave of nausea, bile rising to the back of his throat. He swallows it down, balls his hands to fists under the table. His palms are damp.

“Do you want me to come over there and pour it down yer fucking throat?” Dean says, and Eggsy flinches, reaches for the can.

He can feel Dean’s eyes burning holes in him as he takes the first swig. The cool liquid feels good in his parched mouth, but heavy on his upset stomach. He puts the can down, wipes his mouth with his sleeve.

“C’mon kid, I ain’t got all day,” Dean says.

Eggsy’s stomach roils. He swallows, takes another swig.

“ _Don’t_ ,” Dean snaps, the word like a whip, when Eggsy starts to lower the can again. “Keep fucking—” He shoves to his feet, stalks around the table to where Eggsy’s sitting. Eggsy tilts his head back, drinks faster, the beer scorching down his throat and settling in his stomach like a stone. The can is slippery with condensation and sweat, and it almost slips from his hand. He moves it to his other hand, wipes his hand on his jeans.

“Done?” Dean asks, and Eggsy shakes his head, puts the can to his lips again. By the time he’s finished, his eyes are on fire and he has to swallow several times to keep the beer down. He needs to belch, but he ain’t about to do it here, in front of Dean, who’s sliding the other can his way.

“Drink up,” he says.

Another wave of nausea makes Eggsy hunch over. “Please,” he says, “I don’t—”

“Don’t what?” Dean says, picking up the can. “You don’t want it? You don’t like it? Tough shit, Muggsy. I don’t like it when little pricks like you touch my stuff. Can’t always get what we want now, can we?”

“I’m sorry,” Eggsy says.

Dean’s hand flashes out, and Eggsy recoils but Dean’s hand is already locked around his chin, jerking his head back.

Eggsy almost chokes on the first mouthful of beer. “ _Drink_ ,” Dean says, and Eggsy tries to, he tries but it’s almost impossible to swallow with his head held at this angle—he tries but his throat seizes up and most of the beer runs down his chin and cheeks and throat and he can’t close his mouth because Dean’s thumb and forefinger are pressing down on the hinges of his jaw, forcing it open.

When Dean finally lets go of him, Eggsy doubles over, gags, coughs, gags again. The blow takes him by surprise; he doesn’t even realise Dean has struck him until he’s pressed face down against the table and feels the throbbing heat in his cheek.

“You don’t ever touch my shit, you little fucking prick,” Dean snarls, “understood?” and Eggsy gasps wetly, nods frantically until the pressure on the back of his neck goes away.

(Eggsy is fifteen the first time Dean beats him.

He is twenty-two the last time Dean beats him.

He is twenty-three when finally, the roles are reversed.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fun fact: I was very very close to not cross-posting this one because it's just so awful. I aged Eggsy up a year and removed a few details but that doesn't make it any less awful. What the hell were you thinking, past self? (The good news is it's all uphill from here.)


	2. c is for cigarettes

After Harry dies in Kentucky, Eggsy starts smoking again.

Which is fitting, he supposes, as the last time he’d smoked had been the day he met Harry. He remembers the residual smell of smoke and beer and leather on his hands when he’d pressed his palms to his eyes in the interrogation room, thinking _eighteen months_ and _I fucked up I fucked up I fucked up_ and trying not to think about his mum, about Daisy. He remembers the flame of anger that made him recoil from Harry’s words at the pub _(…bitterly disappointed in the choices you’ve made)_ and pat for his cigarettes out of habit.

With everything that’d happened after—being whisked away to the countryside without as much as a spare pair of socks; months of rigorous training; saving the lives of billions at the cost of thousands—he hadn’t even had time to light up. Hadn’t wanted to, either. The Eggsy who used to smoke felt different from the Eggsy who was a candidate for the Lancelot position.

The Eggsy who goes by Galahad feels different yet again. Galahad wears a bespoke suit; Galahad has oceans of blood on his hands.

Galahad smokes.

 _It’s a disgusting habit_ , Roxy says, and Eggsy agrees. He’d forgotten how the smell invades everything, the pores of your fingers, every single fucking item of clothing you own. He’d forgotten how, after a late evening out or a late evening in, you wake up feeling short of breath, tongue tasting like an ashtray, eyes prickly and dry.

Still he starts smoking again.

Merlin doesn’t say anything about it. Sometimes, on their late evenings in, he wordlessly leans in and reaches for the cigarette in-between Eggsy’s fingers, takes a deep drag. Sometimes he grabs Eggsy’s pack and lights one for himself, always without asking.

 _It keeps my hands busy is all_ , Eggsy tells Roxy. It’s only one of many reasons why.

 

* * *

 

He starts his own collection of front pages. A homage to the man who’d nudged him in the direction of this life. A homage to the man who’d regarded him coldly and said _can’t you see that everything I have done has been about trying to repay him_.

His collection grows. He finds himself in Munich, Bogotá, Singapore. He incurs scratches that scab over and wounds that scar. Merlin’s voice in his ear guides him through unfamiliar situations—diffusing a bomb, grilling a suspect—like a warm hand on his shoulder.

 _What about me, then_ , Eggsy sometimes wishes he could yell at Harry. _Was none of this about me._

But he can’t, so instead he lets his head fall back against the wall and closes his eyes and exhales a long stream of smoke, matching his breathing to Merlin’s.

The cigarette itself keeps his hands busy; the repetitive act of smoking soothes his mind; the burn in his lungs drowns out the ache at the centre of his chest.

These are only a few of the many reasons why.

And it infuriates him, the fact that he feels this way about some old dead bloke he barely even knew. He learns more about Harry from the stories Merlin tells him on their late evenings in than he ever learnt from Harry himself.

One night Merlin leans in, reaches for the cigarette in-between Eggsy’s fingers, and Eggsy surprises himself—surprises them both—by jerking his hand away and curling the other one into the collar of Merlin’s shirt, pressing their mouths together in a desperate question.

“This isn’t what you want,” Merlin tells him softly, gently, and Eggsy wants to snarl _where the fuck do you get off, telling me what I don’t_ —

“This isn’t what _I_ want,” Merlin says, and Eggsy nods, the hot coals of rejection smoldering in his gut, embarrassment setting his face aflame.

 

* * *

 

When Harry returns, Merlin socks him in the jaw hard enough to break his own thumb (“Amateur,” Roxy says when she hears) and knock Harry to the floor.

“You smell awful,” Harry says when Eggsy hugs him, and Eggsy punches him in the shoulder, says, “Piss off, Harry.”


	3. d is for destruction

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In which Valentine’s signal was up for longer—a lot longer. (Or, the apocalypse story no one asked for.)

_Sorry love, gotta save the world_ he’d said, and he’d believed it, too. All three of them had. Four, if you count Tilde.

None of them had realised how far gone the world already was.

 

Lying awake at night, listening to the soft breathing of the sleeping people around him, Eggsy sometimes wonders whether he would stop Valentine again if given the chance.

They say hindsight is 20/20, but in this case the fact that he knows how one scenario played out doesn’t really matter. The other scenario would’ve ended much the same way.

Don’t stop Valentine, and humanity’s fucked.

Stop Valentine, and humanity’s still fucked.

 

None of them have anyone else left.

Merlin’s partner, dead. (They never learn his name, and they never ask. It’s better that way.) Harry’s brother, dead. (“I neither know nor care about the rest of them,” he says, and they never ask why. It’s better that way.) Roxy’s family, dead. Tilde’s family, dead. Percival’s family, dead.

Roxy navigated the chaos of London and visited the estate so that Eggsy didn’t have to. She returned pale and empty-handed, shaking her head.

Eggsy will eventually find a morsel of solace in the thought of Dean’s body rotting away in a pool of its own blood in front of _The Black Prince_.

 

For a while he was hardly able to move with the weight of grief sitting on his chest like a millstone. Dreamt about driving the blade into his own heart instead of Valentine’s back. Woke up shaking, crying, dry-heaving. Walked around red-eyed with rings of small fingerprint-shaped bruises around his upper arms. Went everywhere with Merlin’s hand on his shoulder and Harry by his side as though he’d crumble without their support. (He might’ve.)

It’s hell, for a while, but here’s the thing: when the whole world is burning, even all-encompassing grief ends up taking a backseat to survival.

It’s a harsh but efficient coping mechanism.

 

They flew to Kentucky to retrieve Harry’s body. It seemed pointless to Eggsy at the time—plenty of bodies back at Kingsman, after all. The arsenal in fitting room three had been raided, the shop itself burnt to the ground. HQ, worse. Agents, supporting staff; few had made it out alive, Percival among them.

But Merlin wanted to retrieve Harry’s body, so off they went. It wasn’t as though any of them had anything better to do. Besides, the sky was the safest place to be, and would remain so for a very long time.

(In the cities, fires rage and zoo animals roam the streets; murders and suicides and murder-suicides continue apace; local government workers frantically and fruitlessly attempt to contact their deceased superiors.)

In Kentucky, they find Harry sitting with his back against the church door, holding a handkerchief to the graze on his left cheekbone.

“Ah, there you all are,” he says upon their arrival. “I was beginning to worry you wouldn’t show up.”

(Eggsy realised he was in love with Harry at the exact moment when Harry got shot in the head.

He doesn’t quite know how to reconcile this realisation with the fact that Harry is still alive.)

 

They google _how much of the world has no mobile coverage_ and guesstimate that 75% of the world population has perished overnight. An even higher percentage of world leaders have had their heads blown off. The developed world is all but wiped out.

Roxy suggests checking out places such as the Amazon, the Red Centre of Australia. (“Fordwich,” Percival suggests dryly, but Tilde is the only one to laugh.) Harry suggests going wherever dead bodies aren’t littering the streets. (“Again, Fordwich,” Percival says.) Merlin suggests they try to make up their minds before the plane runs out of fuel.

They don’t, and they strand somewhere along the coast of France, set up camp in a deserted WWII bunker to wait out the worst of it.

(“Wonderful,” Tilde says, and Eggsy can’t tell whether she’s being sarcastic or serious.)

 

They go foraging for food in nearby villages, stepping over corpses to get to refrigerators that are still contentedly humming away. They avoid the bigger towns, hotbeds for crime and infection.

Eggsy dreams about blades and hearts and wakes up shaking with fingerprint-shaped bruises on his arms.

Everywhere he goes, Harry follows.

 

People come and go with news of the outside world.

The news is never good news.

 

Eggsy and Harry fall into each other like pieces of a puzzle.

 

 _Wait out the worst of it_ , they’d decided, but none of them know how long the worst is going to last and they don’t know exactly what ‘it’ is, either. This is the part they don’t show you in the movies. There are disaster movies and there are post-apocalyptic movies, but the wasteland in-between is far too vague and spacious to make for a satisfying narrative.

 

Everything is uncertain, but the solid line of Harry’s body against Eggsy’s feels hopeful and grounding. The nights are cold but Harry’s hands are warm.

“Would you have loved me like this if the world hadn’t gone to shit?” Eggsy asks him one time, and Harry answers, “I loved you like this from the start.”

Lying awake at night, listening to the soft breathing of the sleeping people around him, Eggsy sometimes wonders whether he would stop Valentine again if given the chance.

He thinks maybe he would.


	4. e is for envy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> /e is for excessively introspective character studies

Harry Hart has never been good at sharing.

In his defence, he’s never _had_ to be. As an only child, he’d never had to share his toys; throughout his education and career, he’s rarely had to share first place. Harry always knew how to take, and over the years he has grudgingly learnt how to give.

Sharing is a skill he never quite managed to master, though.

Eggsy, by contrast, may very well have been born without a single selfish bone in his body. From quitting the Marines and voluntarily moving back into an abusive situation for his mother’s sake to risking whiplash and a prison sentence in order to protect his friends, he seems to rarely put his own interests first.

Eggsy shares everything with everyone. He feeds JB scraps from the table, despite Harry’s frequent admonishments. He shrugs out of his jumpers and offers them to Roxy whenever she’s feeling chilly, and somehow doesn’t mind the fact that she holds onto them for weeks on end. He even insists that Harry use his toothbrush when Harry has neglected to pack his on their weekend trip to Cornwall, which Harry objectively finds disgusting but also, subjectively, vaguely arousing.

(“Right,” Eggsy says afterwards, “so you ain’t got no problem sticking your tongue up my arse, but you try and draw the line at using someone else’s toothbrush. That makes sense.”)

Eggsy is the type of person who hands someone he only knows by their code name the keys to his Aston Martin and tells them, “No prob, just bring it back in one piece, yeah?”

Meanwhile, Harry is the type of person who selfishly, irrationally wants to keep the things he loves all to himself.

 

* * *

 

The ferocity of his feelings for Eggsy takes Harry by surprise.

He can count the number of times that he has fallen in love on the fingers of one hand. Testosterone, oestrogen, adrenaline, dopamine, serotonin, oxytocin, vasopressin—he’s familiar with the science, but he’d forgotten about the experience. He’d forgotten what it was like to have your stomach waver at the mere thought of someone, to have your heart rate rise at the sight of them and your mouth go dry at the smell of their aftershave. He’d been half-certain he was too old to ever feel this way again. (Merlin chalks it up to traumatic brain injury.)

 _Mine now_ , Harry remembers thinking the first time he kissed Eggsy, hungrily watching the way Eggsy’s closed eyelids twitched as his soft mouth parted for Harry.

The problem is that Eggsy is not, in fact, _his_.

Eggsy belongs to Daisy and Michelle; Eggsy belongs to Ryan and Jamal; Eggsy belongs to Roxy and Merlin; Eggsy belongs to Kingsman; Eggsy belongs, first and foremost, to himself.

(Harry knows that. Of course he does. But that doesn’t mean he does not get infuriatingly, inordinately jealous of all those who stake a claim—however small—to Eggsy’s heart and time.)

But Eggsy is not a _thing_ Harry can keep. Eggsy is a _person_ with _friends_ and a _demanding job_ and a _life of my own_ and _oh, just piss the fuck off, Harry_.

“You don’t get to give me the cold shoulder just ’cause I chose to spend time with Roxy or Jamal instead of you. Shit, the other day you nearly threw a temper tantrum because I was taking Daisy out for the day. Jealous of a bloody toddler, for Chrissake.”

He’s standing there with his hands curled to fists by his sides, aggressive stance, cheeks blotched with rage. Harry finds himself struck by the realisation that Eggsy shares everything including his feelings. Harry has a short temper, yes, but Eggsy wears his entire heart on his sleeve—anger, sorrow, fear, excitement, devotion, all there for everyone to behold.

“What do you want me to do, huh? Stay in with you and Mr fuckin’ Pickle every second I’m off the clock?”

 _Yes_ , Harry thinks wildly, ludicrously.

“No,” he says.

“Alright, then _what?_ ”

Jaw set, eyes hard. He looks breath-taking. Harry wants to reach for him; wants to guide him upstairs with a hand on the small of his back and devour him. Praise him, spoil him. Love him till it hurts him as much as it’s hurting Harry.

He inhales, flexes his fingers. “Eggsy,” he says. “I’m a flawed, selfish man, but I love you.”

 _Isn’t that enough_ , he wants to say.

Eggsy barks out a tired, frustrated laugh, scrubs his hand down the side of his face. “Yeah, here’s the thing, Harry,” he says, picking up his keys from the kitchen table. “That just ain’t gonna cut it.”

 

 _You’re gonna need to learn to share, mate_ , he texts Harry later, and it takes Harry a long time to swallow his pride, type up his reply.

 _Then teach me_.

 

* * *

 

Harry Hart knows how to take. Over the years, he has learnt how to give.

For Eggsy, he’ll learn how to share.


	5. f is for fury

Harry’s brain is still operating at a sluggish pace, sensory perceptions trickling in one by one instead of emerging as a fully integrated mental picture. The sound of ringing in his ears—an awfully familiar sensation by this point; it was there when he woke up in hospital, and it hasn’t quite gone away since. The tangy smell of blood. The taste of it in his mouth, rich and coppery, familiarly slick under his fingers. The sight of an obnoxious pair of Adidas trainers, white, winged. Familiar in a way that makes his stomach clench.

“Jesus Christ, Eggsy, I told you, he’s concussed,” Merlin’s voice says ruefully, and Eggsy’s voice yells, “I couldn’t give a _shit_ —”

The left side of Harry’s jaw is throbbing. He touches it, realises too late that he is now smearing blood all over his face.

Ah well. He’s had worse, he supposes.

“Get a fucking grip, will you?” Merlin is saying. “He was only off the radar for a few weeks, nothing to get worked up ab—”

“Oh, you think that’s what this is about, do you?” Eggsy says hotly. “I don’t give a fuckin’ toss about—do you know what he said to me before he went and not-died in Kentucky?”

“Well, I’m sure—”

“Said everything he did for me was only ’cause of me dad. _Everything_. And then he stalks off and not-dies before I can get a word in edgeways. See if I’ll ever suck your posh dick again, you fuckin’ wanker. What, he didn’t tell you ’bout that? Yeah, Harry taught me exactly how he likes to get his dick sucked right after teaching me how he likes his martinis. Ain’t that right, Harry? Out of guilt too, I’m sure, huh?”

“My god,” Merlin says, in the tone of voice he uses when he has taken off his glasses and is rubbing the sides of his nose with an exasperated look on his face. “Harry, would you mind getting up and dealing with this mess yourself so that I can be excused?”

“Yeah, please do leave,” Eggsy says. “Leave so I can beat him to a _bloody fucking pulp_.”

“Galahad,” Merlin says gravely, and Harry has already produced an ‘I’m listening’ noise when it dawns on him that Merlin is not, in fact, addressing him. How utterly peculiar. “Harry has been my friend for years. I’m rather fond of him, his many flaws notwithstanding, and I would appreciate it if you would not threaten his life so soon after I got him back.”

“Yeah well, you feel free to fuckin’ keep him, alright,” Eggsy sneers, followed by the sound of footsteps, a draft of air, the door slamming shut so hard the floorboards tremble under Harry.

Harry squints up at Merlin. “He’ll come around,” he says, reaching for Merlin’s proffered hand.

“You sure?” Merlin says doubtfully as he pulls Harry to his feet.

“Yes,” Harry says, remembering Eggsy’s clothes—those white winged Adidas trainers—strewn haphazardly across his bedroom, the feeling of Eggsy’s warm pliant body pressed up against his, the taste of his smile, the sound of his laugh. Thinks, ignoring the way his stomach clenches again,  _He has to_.


	6. g is for ghosts

The fever steals up on him when he’s in Egypt, quite literally smoking out a nest of terrorists. Eggsy stubbornly ascribes the glowing feeling in his cheeks to the heat of the fire, goes back to his hotel room, briefly checks in with Merlin, and passes the fuck out.

He wakes up disoriented and soaked in sweat, the fever now raging full-blown, setting his skin aflame and filling his mind with smog. He makes it to the airport, wastes his last pocket of energy on pretending he’s fine and fit to fly. He smiles at the customs officer, grimaces at his alias—Elijah Doolarge, Merlin, are you taking the fucking piss—and winks at the air hostess, feels his way to his assigned seat, and passes the fuck out again.

When he arrives at Gatwick his itching throat has evolved into a dry cough and he’s shivering uncontrollably. He can’t remember the last time he was this relieved to see the Kingsman cab on the curb. The driver takes one look at him and says, “HQ?”

“Please,” Eggsy says, sinking back into the seat and letting his eyes slide shut.

He slips into a bewildering dream in which he’s back in Egypt, watching immobilised as an army of charred corpses silently marches out of a wall of flames, advancing upon him. Merlin’s voice in his ear is calmly telling him what to do, but his instructions make no sense whatsoever—there’s something about a fig tree—and Eggsy is steadily losing hope. “Wake up, lad,” Merlin eventually says, and Eggsy reckons that’s a solid plan, so he does.

Merlin’s face is very close. His palm forms a welcome island of coolness on Eggsy’s forehead, and Eggsy realises he’s been driven all the way to HQ rather than the shop. He wants to thank the driver but when he glances up at the rear-view mirror the driver’s face has—his skin has melted right off his skull, leaving only eyes and teeth. He wants to tell Merlin, warn him, but his tongue feels too heavy.

“What on earth did you manage to pick up over there, then?” Merlin mutters into his ear, and Eggsy, confused, curls his hands into Merlin’s jumper and thinks about fig trees.

 

He dreams of summer rain and flesh-eating bacteria burrowing into the lining of his lungs and the back of his throat. (His imagination adorns them with tiny glittering eyes and rows of sharp little teeth, like those of sharks. At the same time he remains aware of the implausibility of this image.) He wakes up to people poking him with needles and asking him questions. He coughs at them and swats their hands away and feels the fever rise inside him like a tidal wave, sweeping him away again. He dreams of a congregation of hollow tubes sticking out of the inside of his forearm like a message in Braille he will never know the meaning of.

 

He wakes up and there’s a ghost standing at the foot of his bed.

 

The next time he drifts back to consciousness, Harry Hart is sitting by his bedside. His hair is carefully styled except for one strand lying across his forehead; his clothes are immaculate except for the splatters of pink on his shirt collar. He turns his head to meet Eggsy’s eye, and he looks perfect except for the gaping, ragged hole where his left temple used to be.

Eggsy gasps, “Harry.”

Harry reaches for Eggsy’s wrist, and Eggsy wonders if he’ll be able read the message. When he looks down at where Harry is touching him, though, there are no hollow tubes sticking out of his skin.

Harry’s fingertips carefully press down on the pale belly of Eggsy’s forearm. The folktales are wrong, then, some of them anyway; ghosts can touch you. You can feel the warmth of their skin, the caress of their breath.

“Eggsy,” Harry says quietly, insistently. Eggsy isn’t quite sure what he’s insisting on. “He seems rather out of it,” Harry continues a little louder, and Merlin’s voice answers, “We don’t know what’s wrong with him yet. Blood analysis is still in progress. It could be something biochemical.”

“Maybe they were storing something in the building,” Harry suggests. “The fire may have triggered it–he might’ve been too close.”

He knows about the fire, then; is sitting here discussing Eggsy’s most recent mission with Merlin as though he isn’t dead, as though there isn’t a gaping ragged hole in his temple. It’s started bleeding, too, thick ribbons of dark—almost black—blood hanging down his cheek.

“Harry,” Eggsy repeats, but Harry isn’t looking at him, is still talking to Merlin. Eggsy can’t hear what he’s saying over the buzz in his ears, can’t even make out his own voice, so he clears his throat and tries again. “Harry.”

Harry is leaning in now, and Eggsy closes his eyes because it’s been a while since Harry got shot. God knows what might be crawling around in that hole. Maybe the buzzing he’s hearing is from the flies–

“I’m here,” Harry says, which ain’t fair, is it, because he’s not. He’s dead. “You’re dead,” Eggsy tells him, which feels like a rather odd thing to say to someone he can see and hear and feel, so he clarifies, “You were dead, you died—you got shot—Valentine—”

Maybe Harry doesn’t know he’s dead; maybe he’s lingering like the ghosts in The Sixth Sense, waiting for some unresolved issue to–

“Oh, dear boy,” Harry says, and Eggsy blinks at him. “My dear boy, I’m right here.”

“No,” Eggsy says, “your head—”

He tries to reach for Harry’s temple, tries to make him understand, but something is weighing his arm down. Harry’s hand.

“Blood,” Eggsy says, trying to make Harry understand—maybe if he understands he can let go, can be free, be at peace. But Harry still doesn’t get it, shakes his head, sadly, touches the side of Eggsy’s face with his other hand, the hand that’s not trying to read the now-invisible message on the inside of Eggsy’s wrist.

“He’s hallucinating,” Merlin’s voice says from somewhere far away, supplying the word a small corner of Eggsy’s mind has been searching for since he woke up. Hallucinating. Experiencing things that ain’t real. But he needs to make Harry understand, Harry needs to go into the fucking light or something, damnit.

“You’re dead,” Eggsy says again, and again Harry shakes his head. His thumb is stroking Eggsy’s cheek. He’s rarely this tactile with Eggsy; always maintains a respectful, professional distance that he bridges only with warm words of praise and long looks when he thinks Eggsy isn’t paying attention. Eggsy feels those looks the exact same way he feels Harry’s hand on his face now. They’re just as real.

But Harry ain’t real, he’s—

“Eggsy, I cannot apologise enough for everything I’ve put you through,” Harry says softly, which sounds like a rather ghostly thing to say, like he might evaporate any second from now, the last task that tethered him to this earth resolved at last. But Harry doesn’t evaporate; he smiles wanly and says, “I’m here now,” and Eggsy doesn’t have the strength to argue with him no more. He closes his eyes, focuses on the feeling of Harry’s hands on his skin. Focuses on memorising it in case it won’t be there when he wakes up.


	7. i is for ice

His first coherent thought is _shitting hell, my nipples are freezing off_.

The thought is preceded by a barrage of raw not-quite-feelings and fleeting sensory impressions—hurt hurt fuck cold fucking _cold_ windpipe seizing up lungs convulsing wet cold ow can’t breathe bad very bad.

Eggsy doesn’t exactly feel like he’s dying, but he _could_ be dying, for all he knows. Might be his brain just played its final crescendo and is about to bow out. Sure as hell seemed like it for a second there.

And fuck, his _nipples_.

Eggsy dreams about that one night every once in a while; water rising steadily around him like the panic rising in his throat, Amelia’s lifeless body outstretched across the low wall. It’d been a controlled environment, but apparently that knowledge had done little to lessen the impact of the experience on his subconscious.

This right here is most definitely _not_ a controlled environment. There are differences; considerable differences. They’re out in the open air, for starters. In Venice, of all fucking places. Cracking city, don’t get him wrong, it’s just the canals froze over for the first time in a couple years and—yeah.

Important difference: Merlin’s little psychological testing lab hadn’t been nearly as _motherfucking cold_.

Harry is no longer shouting Eggsy’s name, which is good. Eggsy’s ears are ringing by now. Harry’s still violently shaking him back and forth by his shoulders, though, and it’s making his head hurt.

“Stop,” he tries to say, but his teeth are chattering too much—seriously, Harry, you ain’t got no fucking chill—and he doesn’t make it past the ‘t’. He closes his eyes for a second, just to regroup.

“Eggsy,” he hears over the white noise, Harry’s thumbs pressing down insistently on his cheekbones. “ _Eggsy_ —”

Wait. Harry is cradling his face. Harry isn’t shaking him back and forth; it’s just that Eggsy’s shivering like a Chihuahua during Christmas Eve shopping, is what’s happening.

It dawns on Eggsy that Harry is kneeling over him, hair hanging in his face, eyes wild with concern. He’s almost panting, too. It’s pretty suggestive. In any other situation, Eggsy would either be cracking a joke about it or be quietly pining away. Right now both options seem unnecessarily effortful, so instead he just sort of lies there and tries not to think about how much his nipples hurt.

Harry’s talking to him—words like “focus”, “out of here”, maybe even “hotel”, if Eggsy’s not mistaken. He probably is. He likes the idea, though. He briefly allows himself to indulge in a fantasy of lying in a king-size bed in a pleasantly nondescript room. The softest of sheets and Harry wrapped around him from behind, the combined effort of Harry’s body heat and the sun falling in through the window warming his skin. He catches onto another word—“home”—and the fantasy shifts, morphs into one of them on the Kingsman plane, Harry’s arm around his shoulders, Harry’s lips pressed against his temple.

Eggsy’s chest is still aching. Turns out almost drowning takes quite a toll on you. Who’d have thought.

“Next time you’re trapped by a mark,” Harry says, never one for letting a teaching opportunity go by, “you might want to consider waiting for back-up, rather than jumping off the roof.”

The fantasy dissolving like smoke. 

“Bourne Ultimatum,” Eggsy wheezes. He intends to make it sound like a question— _that was pretty Bourne Ultimatum of me, wasn’t it_ —but the correct intonation pattern dies an untimely death on its way out of his mouth. RIP.

“That river wasn’t frozen,” Harry points out. Pointedly. “You, on the contrary, just head-butted a sheet of ice. There’s a very good chance you’re concussed.”

_Well, they thought Bourne was dead, didn’t they_ , Eggsy thinks at him, also pointedly. Surely ‘presumed dead’ trumps ‘presumed concussed’ in terms of failed… missionness.

“Not dead,” he mumbles, wincing as his jaw cramps up.

Harry huffs out a laugh, sits back on his heels. “Yes, well, there is that,” he says. “Not yet, that is. We really shouldn’t waste any more time. Are you alright to stand?”

Eggsy blames the (presumed) concussion for the fact that he momentarily considers saying _no_ , considers the improbable and frankly embarrassing idea of Harry scooping him up in his arms and lifting him up and carrying him—carrying him away, carrying him to warmth and safety. Carrying him home.

“’m fine,” he says, propping himself up on his trembling arms. He manages to get his legs under him, but they feel shaky and weak, and he loses his balance almost immediately.

Harry catches his elbow, draws him in. “I’ve got you,” he says, softly, breath brushing against the side of Eggsy’s face, and Eggsy—defenseless—closes his eyes, allows himself to lean his forehead against Harry’s chest and breathe in.


	8. j is for jump

Falling in love with Eggsy feels exactly like that—like falling.

Harry opens his eyes and sees Eggsy (raised eyebrows; barely concealed smile; “Took you long enough, been waiting here for hours”), and his stomach wavers in a way that has nothing to do with the medicine in his bloodstream.

He stumbles on the jet bridge and Eggsy’s hand is instantly at the small of his back to steady him, warm and sure, and for a long second there is a ringing in Harry’s ears that reminds him of the way the wind had whistled in his ears during his skydiving test decades ago.

He wakes up halfway across the Atlantic Ocean to find Eggsy slumped in his seat—sighing deeply at the end of an exhale, face soft and sweet in sleep—and Harry goes dry-mouthed and breathless as he remembers the earth approaching faster and faster, a dizzying terrifying blur, and surely any moment now he’ll hit the ground and burst open, come apart at the seams.

 

* * *

 

At the shop he’s greeted like a returning war hero, but, he’s told, the real heroes of this short-lived war were Eggsy and Roxy. Lancelot is all quiet competence, Excalibur all brazen enthusiasm; they make a good team. They’re a breath of fresh air, Merlin says, and Harry looks away from the other end of the table, where Eggsy is cracking up at something Roxy said, and nods.

Eggsy seems calmer, more comfortable within his own skin. He has inside jokes with Percival and calls Merlin _guv_. To Harry, it’s a stabbing reminder of how little time they’ve actually spent together, all things considered. Eggsy may have been Harry’s proposal, but Harry has hardly been a formative influence on him during his time at Kingsman so far. Everything Eggsy is now (bright-eyed, level-headed, self-confident in a charming, irresistible way) he either was all along or developed here under someone else’s wing.

The realisation stings, a little.

Harry tries to ignore it. It isn’t as though Eggsy treats him differently from the others.

 _Perhaps that’s exactly it_ , a voice in the back of his head whispers, but he ignores that, too. Those are not thoughts he should be having. The flash of heat in his chest when Eggsy smiles up at him, the way his pulse speeds up when he unexpectedly runs across Eggsy at HQ—those are not feelings he should be having. He should ignore them, push them away. Hold them down till they stop struggling.

But then he’ll remember Eggsy’s warm steady hand at the small of his back, the sound of Eggsy’s laugh coming from the other end of the room, and he’s powerless against those recollections. He just can’t help himself. When they’re talking he finds himself racking his brain to come up with things to say that will please Eggsy, and when he knows they’re both at HQ he finds himself making up excuses to traverse the hallways (just stretching his legs, fetching a cup of tea, calling on someone in the other wing).

It’s pathetic, that’s what it is. A man of his age craving the presence and approval of a twenty-four-year-old.

Absolutely pathetic.

 

* * *

 

He’s cleared for active duty, and he finds himself in Brussels, Hobart, Caracas. He almost nods off during diplomatic dinners and almost loses his left ring finger jumping through a window somewhere in Saudi Arabia, he can’t remember where exactly (“You need to _stop doing that_ ,” Merlin hisses at him).

Eggsy calls from time to time, regularly sends Harry pictures of his dog and funny things he runs into on his missions. Harry volunteers to watch JB when Eggsy is out of the country. And if he lets the dog sleep on the foot of his bed and cooks more elaborate dinners for JB than he usually does for himself, well, it isn’t as though anyone will ever find out about that, is it?

The evening Eggsy returns to fetch JB, he stays for a couple of drinks. It reminds Harry of the evening they had during their 24 hours together, before Eggsy blew his final task and Harry got shot in the face. Eggsy’s martinis taste much better this time around, though. “You’ve been practising,” Harry says approvingly, and he can feel a blush attempting to climb his cheeks when Eggsy winks at him.

Eggsy gives him a quick, one-armed hug and a warm smile before leaving with JB under his other arm. In the safety of his quiet—he refuses to think of it as _too quiet_ —living room, Harry downs another martini.

 

* * *

 

Eggsy says, “Thanks, Harry, you’re a real mate,” the next time he appears on Harry’s doorstep to hastily press JB’s lead into Harry’s hand. He almost trips over his own feet on his way back to the taxi, giving Harry a little wave over his shoulder. Harry raises a hand and thinks, _I am madly in love with you._

The thought makes his palms feel clammy, his stomach drop like he’s falling, falling, falling.

 

* * *

 

Somewhat unexpectedly, Lancelot is the one to approach him about it—the one, as it turns out, to give him the push. She lingers after a meeting until the room has cleared out save for her and Harry.

“Arthur,” she says. “Do you have a moment?”

Harry leans back in his chair and motions towards the one next to him, but Lancelot doesn’t sit down. “It’s about Eggsy,” she says.

Not _Excalibur_ ; this will be a conversation about personal matters, then. Harry breathes in deeply. “Is he alright?” he asks. Eggsy is out in the field, but he’d checked in with HQ earlier this morning; everything had seemed fine then.

Lancelot crosses her arms, shifts her weight to her other foot. “He’s alright,” she says. “Better than alright, actually.”

Harry frowns. “I don’t—”

“He was different,” Lancelot says. “When we thought you’d died. Not enormously so, but he was. Quieter. Almost single-handedly saved the world, but didn’t seem to derive much joy from it at all. None of the cockiness you would’ve expected from him in that situation.”

Harry’s gut twists at the memory of that last conversation between him and Eggsy before—

“That changed when we found out you were alive,” Lancelot continues. “But it wasn’t until you got back here that he was, well.” She smiles, shrugs. “Eggsy again, really.”

“With all due respect, Lancelot,” Harry says, “I still—”

“I think you understand perfectly well what I am saying, sir,” Lancelot says. “With all due respect as well.”

“Roxanne,” Harry says. He breathes in deeply, lets out a shuddering exhale. “Surely you understand why—”

She doesn’t let him finish. “Why do you think he was the one waiting by your bedside in Kentucky?” she says, departing with a sympathetic smile when Harry doesn’t respond.

 

* * *

 

Harry is cooking breakfast when Eggsy comes to pick up JB. He’s wearing a tracksuit, his hair still wet from a shower. There’s a scratch on his cheek and the hint of bags under his eyes.

“Bacon?” Harry says, and Eggsy huffs out a weary laugh and says, “Fuck yeah.”

Eggsy scarfs down his food even faster than JB does, which is rather impressive. When he’s finished he shifts his chair back until he’s leaning against the wall and then lifts JB onto his lap, starts carding his fingers through the dog’s coat. He looks sated but tired, his head lolling back against the wall. There’s a wet strand of hair curling around one of his earlobes, and he looks like he’s just woken up, like he slept and showered here and came downstairs to Harry cooking breakfast, and Harry aches with how much he wants that. Wants Eggsy shuffling into his kitchen in the mornings, disgruntled with sleep; wants Eggsy in his shower, in his bed. Wants it all.

“Eggsy,” he says, his heart beating in his throat.

Eggsy looks up at him, and Harry takes the plunge.


	9. k is for kingsman

Eggsy is sitting there pale and motionless, eyes vacant, and all Harry wants is to touch him but he can’t. Shouldn’t. Knows he shouldn’t.

He wants to, though.

“Eggsy,” he says, softly.

The corner of Eggsy’s mouth twitches, but Eggsy doesn’t look at him. Not yet.

“Oh, Eggsy,” Harry says, and he almost—almost—reaches out. He stops himself, stuffs his hands into his pockets instead. No touching. Not when Eggsy’s like this. No matter how difficult it is.

Harry isn’t usually a tactile person, not really, but he’s never been all that good with words either. He knows his way around sharp comments and thinly veiled threats, but this, this is something else. When it comes to Eggsy, he doesn’t know how to pour things into words. What he knows is how to use his hands to make Eggsy laugh, make him gasp, make him flex his fingers helplessly into the bed sheets. How to use his hands to make Eggsy smile, make him take a deep breath and settle in himself. But right now, when Eggsy’s like this—no touching. Touch would only make it worse.

So instead Harry repeats Eggsy’s name, because that’s one of the few things he does know how to say.

There are other things he could say, certainly. _I’ve got you; I’m here._ _You’re safe now_. But he’s already used up his daily allowed number of film clichés by stalking into the shop earlier and biting, “Where is he?” in Merlin’s direction without breaking his stride.

“In my office,” Merlin had said, and that’s where Harry had found him, sitting on Merlin’s desk, hands in his lap. Pale and motionless, eyes vacant. Smudges of dust and dirt on his cheeks but physically unharmed. Not a scratch.

“It’s my fault,” Eggsy says, voice hoarse. He looks down, at his hands. “I thought—” He takes a deep breath, rubs his face with his hands, then lets them fall into his lap again. “I was so sure he was right behind me.”

Harry had watched the footage. He knows it’s not Eggsy’s fault. He also knows better than to say so.

“I just…” Eggsy makes a frustrated noise, shakes his head. In his lap, his knuckles are turning white, bloodless. Harry can see the thin scars on them, knows what the skin looks like when broken, torn to shreds. He knows this wild look in Eggsy’s eyes, has seen it before—seen him take it out on walls, on enemies, on himself. “Fuck,” Eggsy says thickly.

“Eggsy,” Harry says, again, and Eggsy’s eyes meet his. Harry continues, “He was a Kingsman. He knew the risks.”

It’s the wrong thing to say. He’s counting on it to be.

“Yeah, tell that to his fuckin’ fiancée,” Eggsy says, eyes flashing. “I’m sure she’ll feel real comforted by your words, Arthur.” He spits out the last word. He’s practically vibrating with it, the rage, the helplessness, the guilt all struggling to get the upper hand. It doesn’t matter which will prevail; the result will be the same.

“It’s an occupational hazard, Galahad,” Harry says, and it works. Eggsy’s punches _hurt_ , hurt like gunshots, heat blooming around the areas of impact. After the third punch Eggsy curls his hands into Harry’s shirt and pulls him in. He buries his forehead in the curve of Harry’s shoulder, and Harry finally gets to wrap his arms around him, hold him tight—tight enough to hurt for a second. Just for a second.

“’m sorry,” Eggsy whispers against Harry’s chest, and Harry kisses the top of his head, whispers Eggsy’s name into his hair.


	10. l is for love

Kingsman has a go-to drink for when one of their own dies, but not for when some of their own save the entire human race from mass self-destruction. Harry makes do with what he has, sits down at the head of the table, and waits.

Eggsy, it turns out, is the kind of person who frets about the hundreds of deaths he couldn’t prevent rather than focus on the billions he could. He acts appropriately upbeat for a while, but it doesn’t take long for him to retreat from the celebrations.

Harry finds him on one of the balconies, leaning against a pillar with one knee pulled up. He’s taken off his suit jacket, rolled up his sleeves; there’s blood on the collar of his shirt, all the way down the front.

“I don’t smoke,” Eggsy says, tapping off ash. “Just. Sometimes.”

Harry watches him take another drag. Watches the way his head bends down, his eyelashes dip. Watches his lips pucker deftly around the filter, the way his fingers carefully cradle the cigarette.

“Everyone my age smoked when they were young,” Harry says. _Everyone my age_. It’s a rather old man thing to say. Doesn’t exactly invite a response either, nothing beyond _I know_ or _uh-huh_. A useless utterance. Judging by his gently mocking smile, Eggsy is thinking the same thing.

“Eggsy,” Harry says before turning and walking back inside. Eggsy looks up, meets his eye. It takes Harry a second to remember what he was going to say. “In our line of work, it’s best not to care too much.”

 

* * *

 

When it happens, Eggsy is drunk and Harry is tipsy—sober enough to realise he should put a stop to this, and not sober enough to follow up on that thought. He wants it too much, is enjoying it too much, Eggsy’s rough fingertips on his cheeks, Eggsy gasping into his mouth, letting out little noises as he presses into Harry’s space. If he’s honest, Harry’s not sure he would have put a stop to it even when sober.

He wants it too much.

The following afternoon, Harry enters the meeting room and sees Eggsy’s face flush and the tops of his ears go red, and he takes his seat feeling infinitely, childishly smug.

“So,” Eggsy says later, when they’re alone. He’s got his arms folded across his chest, his chin tilted up. “I seem to remember sort of, er, forcing myself onto you in a dark corner of a ballroom last night.”

“Really,” Harry says. “Because I seem to remember not feeling the urge to resist at all.”

“Really,” Eggsy echoes, unfolding his arms. “Alright. Good to know.”

“Is that so,” Harry says. “Why?”

Eggsy shrugs, spreads his hands. “Future reference, I s’pose,” he says, and he winks at Harry before leaving.

 

* * *

 

They go on a mission together and stay awake half the night fucking. Harry comes twice, once in Eggsy’s mouth and once on the small of his back. He tries to coax another orgasm out of Eggsy as well, but Eggsy pulls his hand away, mumbling something, and falls asleep with his fingers still wrapped around Harry’s wrist.

The next day Harry’s muscles are sore and he feels physically sated in a way he hasn’t in a long time. Eggsy is cheerful, grinning at Harry like the two of them are in on a joke nobody else knows about.

They don’t need long to take out their target. “We make quite a good team, don’t we?” Eggsy says, shaking a wet strand of hair (his blood) out of his eyes and wiping his hands (not his blood) on his trousers, and Harry aches to kiss him but he doesn’t dare to.


	11. m is for marriage

“We are gathered here today—”

_She’s beautiful_ , Eggsy thinks, not for the first time and not for the last time. She has dark hair and even darker eyes, a small, sharp face. She doesn’t smile much; she’s the kind of woman who gets accosted in the streets by men telling her to _cheer up, love._ She’s also the kind of woman who snaps her fingers to have them beaten to a bloody pulp when they do.

The infrequency of her smiles makes it all the more special when she does smile. And she smiles at Eggsy, has done so quite often ever since she found him bleeding out into the pavement and nursed him back to health.

“A rash tactic,” Merlin had said dryly, “but it’s your mission, Eggsy, and you have to do what you think is best.”

Eggsy didn’t just _think_ ; he _knew_. You don’t head into a deep-cover assignment before finding out everything there is to know about your mark. His strengths, his weaknesses. Then, everything there is to know _about_ his strengths and weaknesses. Eggsy knew everything about her: her impulsiveness, her tendency towards defiance, her soft spot for hurt and defenceless creatures in need of help. She has a bit of a saviour complex—a reasonable way of resolving cognitive dissonance, Eggsy supposes, for the daughter of a major crime lord.

She’s pretty wonderful, is what she is. Maybe a couple years ago, in what Eggsy involuntarily thinks of as _my former life_ , he could’ve actually fallen for her.

“Do you, Chester King Jr—”

And that’s what he needs to remember, isn’t it. He’s not Eggsy. Hasn’t been in months. He’s Chester King Jr and, every once in a while, when he feels it’s safe enough to check in, he’s Galahad. Chester King Jr is a cleverly constructed false identity; Galahad does not exist for the law; Gary Unwin is a simple tailor in London. Nothing Chester King Jr does affects Eggsy in any legal way.

Eggsy is not the one getting married.

“Eggsy,” Harry had said, one evening, voice uncharacteristically soft, “you don’t need to do—” and Eggsy had grabbed him by the shoulders and pushed him back on the bed and straddled him and kissed him, roughly, a little too roughly, to stop him from finishing that sentence. Because Eggsy—Galahad— _did_ need to do this. It wasn’t the only way, but it was the best way. Cut off one head and two grow back, but if you place a bomb inside the belly of the beast… and he’d found a way in, a beautiful woman with a secret smile and a weakness for near-broken things.

“I do,” Chester King Jr says, and he leans in to kiss his wife.

 

That night, when she’s asleep, he disentangles his limbs from hers and slips away to check in. It’s risky, foolish, but he needs to needs to see them, needs to hear it.

Once the video feed is stable, Merlin congratulates him, warmly. He calls Eggsy _lad_ and says it shouldn’t be long now. They’re impressed with everything he’s accomplished already. He’s doing Kingsman proud.

Harry’s eyes flit briefly in Eggsy’s direction. His voice is calm and neutral—distant—when he says, “Yes, well done indeed, Galahad.”


End file.
